Dining Briefs

By FRANK BRUNI

Published: September 12, 2007

Rarely -- if ever -- do you encounter matzo ball soup, fried dumplings and jerk chicken on one menu, but Borough Food & Drink cunningly divines a higher purpose in an apparent hodgepodge.

It's a tribute to the full range of ethnic culinary traditions (Jewish, Chinese, Jamaican and much, much more) that have shaped New York City.

It's a tribute as well to local growers, distillers and purveyors, its larder stocked and its dishes chockablock with fare from nearby farms, markets and even other restaurants. Borough gets herring from Russ & Daughters, the Checkered Cab ale from the Chelsea Brewing Company.

And it gets points for cleverness, humility and a fundamental earnestness that makes its sloppy execution all the harder to digest. Why put this much energy into a novel concept and then subject diners to such a bumbling staff?

One night the entrees arrived just eight minutes after the appetizers, which weren't close to finished.

Perhaps, but no more so than one of her colleagues, who said he was glad we hadn't ordered a contemplated cookie plate because one cookie would be ''greasy'' and another would ''chip your tooth.''

Borough Food & Drink is the new use to which the restaurateur Jeffrey Chodorow has put the space where he tried out Rocco's on 22nd and Brasserio Caviar & Banana. It has the wood-planked look of a rural country store.

Although Paul Williams is the executive chef, Zak Pelaccio consulted, and some dishes -- including pork sliders ($14), made with ground shoulder and fatback -- reflect the fatty abandon of the Fatty Crab, the restaurant Mr. Pelaccio operates in Greenwich Village.

I loved the breaded pickles fried in schmaltz ($5), and I liked crunchy flatbread with guanciale and ricotta ($12).

But a duck salad ($14) and a Greek salad ($12) were both criminally overdressed. Fried chicken ($18) was a greasy, sodden affair, only slightly more enjoyable than a flabby hunk of grayish beef brisket under too much muddy gravy ($19).

More dishes disappointed than pleased me during two visits, while the service remained a loopy, stop-and-go befuddlement.

FRANK BRUNI

PHOTO: MELTING POT: Borough Food & Drink puts various culinary traditions under one roof. (PHOTOGRAPH BY OSCAR HIDALGO FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES)